22 posts
Honest comparisons of cleaner suites and the indie tools that quietly compete with them.
Five genuinely free Mac memory cleaners ranked honestly. Includes macOS itself, sudo purge, OnyX, Memory Cleaner, and Memory Diag.
App comparisonsSeven Mac utilities under 10MB on disk, each focused on one job, each priced fairly. Rectangle, Maccy, Karabiner, Bartender, Shiny, Shottr, AltTab. Honest picks.
App comparisonsThe lightest, fastest apps for 8GB Macs. Safari over Chrome, Apple Mail over Gmail, Bear over Notion. Honest picks, organised by job.
App comparisonsSeven Mac apps with explicit no-telemetry policies, organised by category. Browser, notes, RSS, PDF, memory, and launcher picks. With notes on how to verify each claim yourself.
App comparisonsFive legitimate Mac memory cleaners ranked by what they actually do. Honest pricing, honest tradeoffs, including the free ones.
App comparisonsSeven Mac apps you can buy once and use forever. iA Writer, PDF Expert, Mimestream, Obsidian, Alfred, and more. Honest notes on price and fit, organised by category.
App comparisonsSeven great Mac apps you pay for once or not at all. Browser, notes, mail, calendar, RSS, memory, and maintenance, no monthly bills required.
App comparisonsCleanMyMac bundles many jobs. Mix-and-match focused alternatives by job and pay roughly $15 once instead of $40 per year. Honest breakdown of which app does which job.
App comparisonsThree big-name Mac cleaner brands compared honestly: CleanMyMac, CCleaner, and MacKeeper. Price, safety, track record, and who each one is actually for.
App comparisonsAn honest comparison of CleanMyMac and MacKeeper. MacPaw's track record vs MacKeeper's turbulent history. Which one is actually worth using in 2026?
App comparisonsiStat Menus is the gold-standard paid Mac system monitor. Stats is the free, open-source alternative that does roughly 90 percent of the same job. An honest side-by-side.
App comparisonsMacKeeper bundles memory, antivirus, VPN, cleaner, and more for $60-110/year. Mix-and-match focused alternatives by job and pay a fraction of that. Honest breakdown of which app does which job.
App comparisonsMemory Clean was built for Intel-era macOS. On Apple Silicon its assumptions are out of date. Five modern alternatives, categorised by what they actually do: monitor, act, or both.
App comparisonsSetapp is $9.99/month for 240+ Mac apps. The bundle is genuinely good value if you use ten or more apps actively. If you only need three or four, buying them once usually costs less over five years. Here is the honest math.
App comparisonsActivity Monitor diagnoses. Shiny acts. An honest look at what each tool does, when Activity Monitor is enough, and when Shiny adds value.
App comparisonsAn honest side-by-side comparison of Shiny ($4.99 once, memory-only) and CleanMyMac (~$40/year, full suite). Where each one wins, who each one is for.
App comparisonsiStat Menus monitors your Mac live (CPU, RAM, sensors). Shiny frees memory in one click. They do different jobs. An honest comparison.
App comparisonsAn honest side-by-side comparison of Shiny ($4.99 once, memory-only) and MacKeeper ($60-110/year, full suite). The history question answered plainly, and where each one wins.
App comparisonsAn honest side-by-side comparison of Shiny ($4.99 once, Apple Silicon-native) and Memory Clean 3 (free + IAP, Intel-era design). Where each one wins, who each one is for.
App comparisonsAn honest side-by-side comparison of Shiny ($4.99 once, no upsells) and Memory Cleaner by Nektony (free tier + paid upgrade). Where each one wins, who each one is for.
App comparisonsAn honest side-by-side comparison of Shiny ($4.99 once) and Memory Diag by Rocky Sand Studio (free + Pro). Where each one wins, who each one is for, and whether you can use both together.
App comparisonsAn honest side-by-side comparison of Shiny ($4.99 once, menu-bar memory cleaner) and OnyX (free, broad maintenance toolkit). Different tools for different jobs.